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Among the Bangala of the Upper Congo, while a man is fishing and when he returns with his catch, his proper name is in abeyance and nobody may mention it. Whatever the fisherman's real name may be, he is called mwele without distinction. The reason is that the river is full of spirits, who, if they heard the fisherman's real name, might so work against him that he would catch little or nothing.
Numerous villages are studded all over the valley; but these possess no permanence, and many more existed previous to the Portuguese expedition of 1850 to punish the Bangala. This valley, as I have before remarked, is all fertile in the extreme. The Portuguese informed me that no manure is ever needed, but that, the more the ground is tilled, the better it yields.
On the 15th we reach Yakussu, where is a Mission Station of the English Baptists. As I cannot go ashore, the missionary, Mr. Stapleton, comes on board and we have an interesting chat. He has known the Bangala District for many years and has seen the riverside population diminish very much during the last fifteen years.
The soil is exceedingly fertile, of a dark red color, and covered with such a dense, heavy crop of coarse grass, that when a marauding party of Ambonda once came for plunder while it was in a dried state, the Bangala encircled the common enemy with a fire which completely destroyed them.
The Watershed between the northern and southern Rivers A deep Valley Rustic Bridge Fountains on the Slopes of the Valleys Village of Kabinje Good Effects of the Belief in the Power of Charms Demand for Gunpowder and English Calico The Kasai Vexatious Trick Want of Food No Game Katende's unreasonable Demand A grave Offense Toll-bridge Keeper Greedy Guides Flooded Valleys Swim the Nyuana Loke Prompt Kindness of my Men Makololo Remarks on the rich uncultivated Valleys Difference in the Color of Africans Reach a Village of the Chiboque The Head Man's impudent Message Surrounds our Encampment with his Warriors The Pretense Their Demand Prospect of a Fight Way in which it was averted Change our Path Summer Fever Beehives and the Honey-guide Instinct of Trees Climbers The Ox Sinbad Absence of Thorns in the Forests Plant peculiar to a forsaken Garden Bad Guides Insubordination suppressed Beset by Enemies A Robber Party More Troubles Detained by Ionga Panza His Village Annoyed by Bangala Traders My Men discouraged Their Determination and Precaution.
The Bangala were very troublesome to the Portuguese traders, and at last proceeded so far as to kill one of them; the government of Angola then sent an expedition against them, which being successful, the Bangala were dispersed, and are now returning to their former abodes as vassals.
Here you get another parallel with his American brother. A Bangala, for example, will talk for a week about five centimes. One day at Dima I heard a terrific shouting and exhorting down at the native market which is held twice a week. I was certain that someone was being murdered. When I arrived on the scene I saw a hundred men and women gesticulating wildly and in a great state of excitement.
We might have succeeded very well with him, for he was by no means unreasonable, and had but a very small village of supporters; but our two guides from Kangenke complicated our difficulties by sending for a body of Bangala traders, with a view to force us to sell the tusks of Sekeletu, and pay them with the price.
At this juncture a half-caste Portuguese, a sergeant of militia, Cypriano Di Abreu arrived, and, obtaining ferrymen, they crossed over into the territory of the Bangala, who are subject to the Portuguese. They had some time before rebelled, and troops were now stationed among them, Cypriano being in command of a party of men.
The result produced by the glare of Rupe's unfamiliar eyes, and by the dreadfully suggestive proximity of Rupe's unfamiliar nose, was altogether different. Herman's and Verman's Bangala great-grandfathers never considered people of their own jungle neighbourhood proper material for a meal, but they looked upon strangers especially truculent strangers as distinctly edible.
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